Study: Google Glass Improves Surgeon's PerformanceStudy: Google Glass Improves Surgeon's Performance

Word on the street is that head-mounted displays like Google Glass are a solution looking for a problem to solve. As one article put it: Nobody knows what it's for.

But as it turns out, Google Glass and similar technologies may end up playing an important role in medicine--especially in surgery. In the past couple of years, scores of surgeons have tested out the technology, often with rave reviews. To date, however, hard data were lacking about its benefits in the operating room (OR), however.

A recent study out of Stanford, however, changes that, providing early evidence that Google Glass markedly improves the surgeon's abilities. In particular, it boosts their situational awareness and ability to track vital signs in real time, thus improves patient safety as well--especially when anesthesiologists are not present.

In the randomized study, 14 surgery residents performed standardized thoracostomy tube placement and bronchoscopy procedures. The group that used Google Glass to live stream vital signs could recognize a critical desaturation event during bronchoscopy 8.8 seconds earlier than the control group. The Google Glass group also could identify hypotension during thoracostomy tube placement 10.5 seconds earlier than the control group.

When surveyed, the majority of participants "'agreed' or 'strongly agreed' that Google Glass increased their situational awareness (64%), was helpful in monitoring vital signs (86%), was easy to use (93%), and has potential to improve patient safety (85%)."

Another area where Google Glass could help surgeons excel is its ability to give surgeons hands free control over some equipment in the OR.

EE Times reports that a Google Glass-compatible interface known as Myo could help surgeons do just that. "The Myo helps medical personal because you don't actually have to touch devices to control them, you can just perform a hand gesture to manipulate the display," said Scott Greenberg, director of development at Thalmic Labs Inc. in Waterloo, CA in an interview with EE Times. "This is especially important in a surgical setting where you can't touch things because your hands are sterile."

Greenberg explains how it works: "The Myo is an arm band with eight EMG sensors that picks up the actions of your muscles, for instance when you make a fist, or point a finger it can pick up on that. And the IMU helps to determine how you are moving that hand gesture, whether you are rotating a virtual knob, or instance. Connected to a computer over Bluetooth we provide a SDK [software development kit] that lets developers use gestures for their own applications."

In medtech, the maker of Myo is already partnering with the Google Glass obsessed San Francisco-startup Augmendix (check out their about page). The two firms are collaborating to develop a Google Glass system that enables clinicians to easily access medical data with hand gestures.

Brian Buntz is the editor-in-chief of MPMN and Qmed. Follow him on Twitter at @brian_buntz.

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